Ardmore is a good place to live if you want to be four minutes from downtown Wilmington in a 1930s house, outside the flood zone, with no association telling you what to do. It is the wrong place if you need square footage, a yard, strong assigned schools or a choice of houses, because there is usually only one for sale at a time.
Ardmore is a 144-lot plat, not a subdivision with a gate and an entrance sign. It sits inside the Wilmington city limits in ZIP 28403, bounded by South 18th Street, Carolina Avenue, Castle Street and Wrightsville Avenue, and New Hanover County’s 2026 tax roll carries 144 parcels whose recorded legal description reads Ardmore. Nun Street has 35 of them, Ann Street 30 and Church Street 27.
Most people who ask us about Ardmore have driven it once and liked the look of it. The honest version is that what makes it appealing and what rules it out are the same three things: it is small, it is old, and it is in town.
What you actually get for the money
The houses are small and the lots are smaller. Across the 138 residential parcels the county roll shows a median heated area of 1,363 square feet, running from 740 to 3,097, on a median lot of 0.11 acres. The median year built across Census Tract 102 was 1941. Ardmore is one of six early twentieth century subdivisions making up the Westbrook-Ardmore Historic District, listed on the National Register on February 5, 2009, with about 134 acres and 467 contributing buildings built from roughly 1914 to 1956 in Bungalow, Craftsman and Colonial Revival styles.
- Eight sales of $10,000 or more recorded inside the plat in the 12 months ending November 4, 2026, median $347,000, from $280,000 on Castle Street to $549,900 on Nun Street New Hanover County 2026 tax roll, queried November 4, 2026
- Median 2026 appraised value across the 138 residential parcels: $426,200, from $88,100 to $696,400 New Hanover County 2026 tax roll, November 4, 2026
- Exactly one active listing inside the plat: 1914 Nun Street, two bedrooms, 1,300 square feet, asking $499,000 Coldwell Banker ZIP 28403 search, all seven pages read November 4, 2026
- New Hanover County median sale price: $464,000, with 61 days on market against 34 a year earlier Tidal Realty Partners New Hanover County market update, three months ending September 2026
- Combined property tax rate inside the city: 63.75 cents per $100, about $2,717 a year on the median appraisal New Hanover County 2026 tax rates, county 30.6 cents plus City of Wilmington 33.15 cents
Those three price measures sit below the county median of $464,000, and that is the argument for Ardmore. You are buying in-town Wilmington for less than the county midpoint. What you are not buying is choice. Eight recorded sales in a year across 144 lots means most months there is nothing here at all, and the one listing on the market had been sitting 576 days when we read it. Our New Hanover County market update shows buyers across the county with 1,251 active listings to work through. Ardmore buyers do not get that luxury.
The location is the whole argument
Approximate drives from the middle of the neighborhood, routing estimates with no traffic, calculated November 4, 2026: Novant Health New Hanover Regional Medical Center on South 17th Street is about 1.3 miles and 3 minutes, downtown Wilmington at Water and Market about 1.7 miles and 4 minutes, UNCW about 4.1 and 11, Wilmington International Airport about 6.6 and 16, Mayfaire Town Center about 7.2 and 14, and Wrightsville Beach at Johnnie Mercers Pier about 9.3 and 18.
Add real minutes at rush hour. South 17th Street carries hospital traffic and Wrightsville Avenue carries beach traffic, so the edges of Ardmore are loud while the interior stays quiet. If noise matters, buy on Nun or Ann. For a hospital employee, or anyone who wants to walk the Riverwalk on a weeknight, this location is hard to beat at this price.
The neighborhood has its own park. The City of Wilmington owns Church and Nun Park at 1922 Nun Street, with a playground and a picnic shelter, inside the plat. Wallace Park on Market Street is under a mile north, and Greenfield Park on Burnett Boulevard is 250 acres with a 4.8-mile paved loop around the lake.
The schools are the real drawback
We ran all 144 parcel points through the New Hanover County Schools locator boundary layer on November 4, 2026. Every one falls in study area 151 and returns the same three schools, with no split, which is unusual for an in-town Wilmington plat: Annie H. Snipes Elementary on Chestnut Street, Williston Middle on South 10th Street, and John T. Hoggard High on Shipyard Boulevard.
On the 2024-25 North Carolina School Report Cards, Snipes scored 44 with a performance grade of D and met expected growth, Williston scored 34 with a grade of F and did not meet growth, and Hoggard scored 75 with a grade of B and met growth. We are not going to soften that. If you have children who will attend the assigned public schools, the elementary and middle pairing is the single biggest reason to look elsewhere, and families who buy here are usually choosing private, charter or a magnet application. Run the district locator on the exact address before you write an offer, because assignments change.
Flood, insurance and the tax bill
Flooding is the good news, and it is unusually good for a Wilmington neighborhood. We queried New Hanover County’s 2025 flood hazard layer at all 144 parcel points on November 4, 2026, and every one came back Zone X, outside the special flood hazard area. FEMA’s National Flood Hazard Layer agrees, mapping the neighborhood as an area of minimal flood hazard on FIRM panel 3720312700K, effective August 28, 2018. Pull the determination on the specific parcel anyway.
Insurance is still a coastal cost. ZIP 28403 sits in Territory 140, the Eastern Coastal territory in the North Carolina Department of Insurance rate structure. In the settlement published January 17, 2025, the Rate Bureau asked for 71.4 percent there and the Commissioner approved 10.5 percent in 2025 and 10.1 percent in 2026, against a 7.5 percent statewide average. ZIP 28401, a few blocks west, is in Territory 160 and took 5 and 4.8 percent. Get a real quote on the house and ask for the named storm deductible in dollars.
Your tax bill has two lines, and the city line just moved. New Hanover County’s 2026 rate is 30.6 cents per $100, and the City of Wilmington adds 33.15 cents, for a combined 63.75. On the $426,200 median appraisal that is roughly $2,717 a year. Council adopted the fiscal year 2027 budget on June 16, 2026 with a 4.9-cent city increase, and the county revaluation took effect January 1, 2025 on a four-year cycle, so the next reset lands in 2029.
There is no association. The 2026 county roll shows no homeowners association holding common area inside the plat, so there are no dues and no board. Westbrook-Ardmore is a National Register district rather than one of the City of Wilmington’s locally designated districts, so there is no certificate of appropriateness and nothing beyond zoning governs what your neighbor builds. The upside of the listing is money: the state historic preservation office runs a 15 percent income tax credit for owner-occupied rehabilitation of a contributing building, on expenses above $10,000 within 24 months, capped at $22,500. Confirm the house contributes before you budget around it.
Two things make Ardmore harder to buy than to admire. The first is the comp problem. Census Tract 102 is majority renter, with 824 of 1,778 occupied units owner occupied, and only eight sales closed inside the plat in the past year. Appraisals here lean on a small and uneven comp set, which means an appraisal gap is a live risk and you should talk to your lender about it before you offer. The second is the houses themselves. With a tract median year built of 1941, assume questions about wiring, original sewer laterals and crawl spaces, and put a renovation number in your offer rather than discovering it in inspection. If you want a bigger lot a mile east with a different set of trade-offs, read our Forest Hills guide. If you want a commercial street at the door, read our Historic Downtown guide instead.
Related questions people also ask
How much do homes cost in Ardmore, Wilmington?
The steadiest benchmark is the county’s own file rather than the listings, because so little comes on the market. New Hanover County’s 2026 tax roll puts the median appraised value across the 138 residential parcels at $426,200, and records eight sales of $10,000 or more inside the plat in the 12 months ending November 4, 2026 at a median of $347,000. On November 4, 2026 there was exactly one listing inside the plat, at $499,000. All three figures sit below the county median sale price of $464,000.
Is Ardmore in a flood zone?
No. All 144 parcel points came back Zone X, outside the special flood hazard area, when we queried New Hanover County’s 2025 flood hazard layer on November 4, 2026, and FEMA maps the neighborhood as an area of minimal flood hazard on FIRM panel 3720312700K, effective August 28, 2018. That makes Ardmore unusual among in-town Wilmington neighborhoods. It does not make insurance cheap, because the ZIP sits in the Eastern Coastal rate territory where base rates rose 10.5 percent in 2025 and 10.1 percent in 2026.
What schools does Ardmore feed into?
All 144 parcels fall in the same study area and return Annie H. Snipes Elementary, Williston Middle and John T. Hoggard High through the New Hanover County Schools locator, with no split anywhere in the plat. On the 2024-25 North Carolina School Report Cards, Snipes scored 44 with a grade of D and met growth, Williston scored 34 with a grade of F and did not meet growth, and Hoggard scored 75 with a grade of B and met growth. Verify the assignment on the exact address with the district before you write an offer.
Because there is rarely more than one house for sale here, the work is being ready before the house is: financing lined up, an inspector on call and a renovation number already in hand. Tell us what you are looking for and we will watch the plat for you and tell you the day something lists. Schedule a consultation and we will put the plan together before the next one comes up.
Sources: New Hanover County 2026 tax roll, parcel, sales and appraisal data queried November 4, 2026; Coldwell Banker ZIP 28403 search, all seven pages read November 4, 2026; New Hanover County Schools locator boundary layer, November 4, 2026; 2024-25 North Carolina School Report Cards; New Hanover County 2025 flood hazard layer and FEMA National Flood Hazard Layer, FIRM panel 3720312700K effective August 28, 2018; North Carolina Department of Insurance and Rate Bureau settlement, January 17, 2025; New Hanover County 2026 tax rates and City of Wilmington FY27 budget release, June 17, 2026; National Park Service, Westbrook-Ardmore Historic District, National Register reference 08001414; American Community Survey 2020 to 2024, Census Tract 102; Tidal Realty Partners New Hanover County market update, three months ending September 2026. All of the above assembled in our Ardmore community guide.
